In general, an air purifier absorbs polluted indoor air, filters dust and odor particles contained in the air, and purifies the absorbed air to create clean air. The purified air is discharged to the outside of the air purifier, i.e., indoors.
In other words, the air purifier absorbs polluted surrounding air, purifies the absorbed air, and discharges clean air to the outside, thereby purifying the air surrounding an area where the air purifier is installed.
In order to perform such operations, the air purifier may commonly include an air blower allowing for the inflow of surrounding air and the discharge of purified air, and a filter allowing for the filtering of dust and odor particles contained in the inflow air.
Although the air purifier is able to absorb surrounding air, purify the inflow air, and discharge the purified air, it is unable to remove moisture contained in the inflow air. Accordingly, if the air purifier runs in an atmosphere having high humidity such as that of summer, the moisture contained in the air may be transmitted into a deodorizing filter and attached thereto.
Eventually, the accumulated moisture attached to the deodorizing filter may degrade the performance of the deodorizing filter. For example, if the moisture is attached to the surface of the deodorizing filter, it may be tangled with pollutants in the air. This may result in the increased pollution level of each filter or in reduced blowing efficiency caused by the blockage of the pores of each filter, thereby causing a reduction in a filter replacement period and in the lifetime of the filter.
In order to solve this problem, an air purifier currently has a dehumidifying part installed therein and air purifying filters installed behind the dehumidifying part in terms of an air flow path, thereby allowing for dehumidification and air purification at the same time.
However, this air purifier requires the inflow air to pass through the dehumidifying part and the air purifying filters, so the constant pressure required for the inflow air is large, whereby dehumidifying and purifying performances are degraded.
That is, when the inflow air having a single airflow is subject to dehumidification and air purification at the same time, discharged airflow amount is reduced.